Join us for a reading with Texas State MFA faculty. Featuring Cyrus Cassells, Naomi Shihab Nye, and Debra Monroe.

Cyrus Cassells is the author of six acclaimed books of poetry: The Mud Actor, Soul Make a Path through Shouting, Beautiful Signor, More Than Peace and Cypresses, The Crossed-Out Swastika, and The Gospel according to Wild Indigo. Among his honors are a Lannan Literary Award, a William Carlos Williams Award, a Pushcart Prize, two NEA grants, and a Lambda Literary Award. He teaches at Texas State University in San Marcos.

Naomi Shihab Nye’s most recent book is Voices in the Air – Poems for Listeners. She lives in old downtown San Antonio near the river, and has driven to Austin 1 million times. Currently on the faculty at Texas State University, she was a visiting writer at the Michener Center for Writers for many years.

Debra Monroe is the author of four books of fiction, and two memoirs. Her first book  won the Flannery O’Connor Award for Fiction, and was acclaimed as a “fierce debut” that presents “ever-hopeful lost souls” (Kirkus Reviews). Her writing has been described as “fine and funky, marbled with warmth and romantic confusion, but not a hint of sentimentality” (Boston Globe), “rangy, thoughtful, ambitious, and widely, wildly knowledgeable (Washington Post), and “a heady rush of adventure, optimism and fearlessness” (Houston Chronicle). She has published essays in many journals including Salon, The New York Times, Longreads, Guernica, and is regularly cited in Best American Essays.